For men who are into sucking blood, Blood Sacraments (Bold Strokes) is the collection for you: nineteen stories of vampire sex edited by Todd Gregory. It’s my first exposure to blood lust, as opposed to lusty Bloods in South Central. Although, they could easily make another collection.

I loved the first story “Black Sambuca.” Although, I wasn’t ready to open my veins, Jeff Mann kept me on the edge of my seat through the whole chapter as someone who knows what being fucked feels like.

The vampire Cord likes to be fucked, pleads to be fucked, and enjoys every minute of it, with a vampire of “older blood.”

He started walking again, and I began following him, focusing on the curve of his buttocks in his jeans. The T-shirt was a little too small riding up on the back so I could see the dimples of his lower back just above the swell of his ass.

He was a little more slender than I liked, but it didn’t matter since I wasn’t going to fuck him. I was just going to pierce his neck for moment drink from his veins until his desire faded and I returned to my normal state.

He’s hunting with a buddy and confronted by someone who throws one of them against a dumpster (sounds like the trucks?). Later he corners his prey in a lot of impounded cars. This is a very real world, where Vampires spray to mark territory.

Have you ever lived with someone who, say, brought you out, and after a while the sex is gone and he’s “dragging weird shit home?” It’s true for vampires in Jay Lygon’s story “Kells,” whose vampires go through the same shit we all go through.

First time I saw you was in the club. You were dancing on the edge of the floor, eyes closed, lost in the music. I was going to try to pick you up, but I got close and realized you were like me. So I followed you. Watched. You’re incredible. That blond idiot you hunt with is a disgrace, though. Sloppy. No stealth.

“Kells? Yeah, he’s kindava loser. ” That slipped out before I could stop it, but once it was said I knew that was how I felt.”

Nathan Burgone’s “Three” is a Vampire love tangle worthy of “Twilight.” If ever you’ve heard complaints from friends who were bested in bars by blondes with massive shoulders, you know the story.

This vampire must be living in some other place or time because an orange crystal on a simple silver chain around a guy’s neck is all he needs to get his fangs out (erect?). Isn’t body jewelry on gay men these days limited to Prince Albert’s and nipple rings? Oh yeah, and wedding rings?

He notes a bare-chested straight bartender who just does it for money. I know bare-chested gay bartenders who do it just for money. One was my partner for 18 years. Tell me something that gets me hard. Were his fangs thick and veined?

“The Bone Box” by Joseph Baneth Allen, the most touching in this collection, features Tommy McDevitt, a homeless kid who gets caught trying to steal a Mustang that he’ll sell and get enough cash to survive. The owner attacks him, but he’s saved by a dark-eyed man with “a devilishly handsome aristocratic face framed with an impeccably neat red beard and mustache.”

His savior Darren Frazier takes him home. He says he wants Tommy’s help in finding his lover who’s been taken to an institution. Darren says, Tommy has to get into the shelter to find his lover. After previous escapes from youth detentions Tommy knows what to expect.

Darren knocks him out and leaves him in a dumpster where he’s found and taken to the shelter. Josh who takes care of him at the shelter is kind but doesn’t let him enjoy the sun because he’s a vampire. With no sex or blood sucking Tommy discovers in the end that Darren is using him to get his lover back to his blood addiction.

After a struggle Darren is killed and his former lover and Tommy remain among friends in the shelter. This is a poignant tale of men discarded by society with its vivid portrayal of homelessness, addiction and recovery.

Gregory has assembled tales of vampires very much like gay men in our lives: there’s something for everyone. Read them for pleasure and not when issues like the recent elections are sucking the life out of you.
—BLOOD SACRAMENTS
By Todd GregoryBold Strokes Books
Paperback, 9781602821903, 364pp.
November 2010

Wisconsin raised, east coast educated, San Francisco resident since 1971 and HIV+ since 1978. Worked for three SF Mayors, early board chair of HRC, and led fundraising campaign for the Hormel Gay & Lesbian Center at the SFPL. Currently a writer of poetry memoirs and fiction; wears T-shirts and jeans.